Technological & Institutional Roots of Democratic Backsliding in the US

• In Event: The Crisis of Liberal Democracy: Connective Action & the Rise of the Far-Right

Abstract

Democratic backsliding, the slow erosion of democratic institutions, processes, and norms, has become more pronounced in recent years. This paper develops a conceptual framework for explaining backsliding that builds on historical, sociological, economic, and political science approaches. The institutionalist approaches favored by these fields often emphasize the role of “surrogate organizations” –single-issue groups, certain types of media organizations, and cultural institutions such as churches–that parties recruit in order to expand their voter bases, sometimes with the risk of pushing conservative parties even farther to the right. While insightful, the institutionalist literature offers little about the role of social technologies that have the capacity to organize and incorporate fragmented extremist networks that present even greater challenges to party leadership and principles. We correct this oversight by developing a “connective action framework” that explains how digitally networked organization can bring scattered extremist factions into conservative parties, pushing them in illiberal directions.

Authors

• Steven L. Livingston, George Washington University

• Lance Bennett, University of Washington, Seattle